Caturanga: The Ancient Chess Battle

My quest to discover the historic roots of the game of chess led me straight to the ancient Hindu text-- The Mahabharata.

Once I tried to read it, it was easy to see a connection betweenthe game of chess and this complex story, or I should say stories-- the Mahabharata. The ancient Indian epic is as richly entertaining, as intellectually challenging and as sparking of the flame of the imagination as chess is. Intricate, woven, full of twists and turns, resplite with the cause and effect nature of karma this very long story of a very short war is. The war, the Kurukshetra, only lasted eighteen days. But the epic never seems to end. It really doesn't. It even seems to extend as far backwards as forwards, like infinity, like the number of stars in the universe, like the number of possible chess games. The characters as well, infinitely complex, although the number of main characters is certainly manageable as it is a war between two families, the Kurus and the Pandavas, for the fertile land near where the Yamuna and Ganges rivers meet.

The Caturangabala is the Ancient Indian standing military. It had four branches, the Chariotry, the elephants, the cavalry and the infantry. These are represented in the ancient game Chaturanga, the predecessor to chess, respectively as the rook, the bishop, the knight and the pawn. The king and queen seem to come later, or if they were included in the ancient game were the Raja, (king) and the military advisor. India was known for it's standing military, and the strength of that military was legendary. The battle that takes place in the Mahabharata is profoundly spiritual in nature. During this battle Arjuna tells Krishna (both of whom are reincarnations of the Vedic god Vishnu) to drive the chariot right into the thick of battle. Krishna drives him there and then stops, and tells Arjuna "take a good look at your enemies." When Arjuna looks he sees his relatives he puts down his bow. Later, when the battle continued with all kinds of treachery and deception, Krishna drives Arjuna away from his victory. He pulls Arjuna out of the chariot and away from it. Arjuna looks back to see one of the gods was in there with them, and leaves. Once that god leaves the chariot explodes into flames. The message? It wasn't your tremendous skills in battle but the gods protection that made you victorious.

Like the game of chess, the world of the Mahabharata is one where illusion and reality can barely be told apart. I am not sure if this is intentional, or if it is simply that complex of a story. Not only is the story difficult to understand, but there are tons of little side stories that meander off into nowhere, kind of like the variations in a chess game, you know, the moves we don't play. The alternate universe chess games that could have happened. And there is a seemingly infinite number of them in each game.

Chess is a game of illusions, a logical magic show. Take this example from a classic Fischer game. It looks like Bobby Fischer just hung his queen, right? White has to capture it, and then it's checkmate. Stare long enough and you will see it.

What looks like it isn't there, suddenly will appear. What looks like it is there will suddenly disappear. This happens in chess, and it certainly happens in the Mahabharata.